


The Stranger

by Sapphiremoonlight1



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS
Genre: Acceptance of loss, Alternate Ending, Gen, fusion fic technically, technically oc? idk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:27:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23662300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphiremoonlight1/pseuds/Sapphiremoonlight1
Summary: “Here take this. The train leaves in a couple of hours. Oh! And here's your bag.Wait tell Kusanagi I said hello!”Kiku all but kicked him out and told him not to come back without something proving he actually made it to Den City. Eventually he made it back only to run into a particularly interesting stranger. Who is he really and why does he keep popping up and causing trouble.
Relationships: Fujiki Yuusaku & Homura Takeru
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	The Stranger

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a rewrite of Life Goes On, my first story and it spiralled into this. I like this one more it's better written and the ending isn't as bizarre. No weird statues in sight!

“Here take this. The train leaves in a couple of hours. Oh! And here's your bag.Wait tell Kusanagi I said hello!” 

Kiku all but kicked him out and told him not to come back without something proving he actually made it to Den City. Takeru wasn't sure what he did to elicit that kind of response from her but he wasn't going to argue mostly because his grandparents would agree would her and he'd still be stuck waiting for a late night train. 

Oh well, it's not like sulking around their apartment was helping him. Some warning would have been nice, though! 

To top it off Kusanagi laughed at him when Takeru explained why he was in town. 

“Don't worry about getting a hotel you can stay with me while you're here.”

“Thanks. Kiku told you ahead of time didn't she?” 

“Yep. She said she had enough of your moping, so she kicked you out until the hospital made its final decision.”

“Aren't you worried that might take awhile, didn't they delay things with Jin?”

Kusanagi sighed deeply and crossed his arms, “Yeah, but he has a family to support him. Yusaku is an orphan so the government and the hospital are the ones who get to make any decisions in what happens to him. Unless we figure out what happened back then there isn't much we can do for him.” 

“Anyway it's your first time back in the city in awhile why don't you go out and explore! Go on go have some fun, we can talk about all this depressing stuff after I close up shop tonight.”

“Yeah fun,” he replies before taking a seat a cafe as a few customers came through. The other man kept glancing in his direction as he worked but otherwise left Takeru to sulk in peace. Maybe Kiku was right. 

“Why hello there stranger,” greets an odd looking customer. 

“Stranger? You're here almost everyday!”It's good to know Kusanagi hasn't changed. Still laid back and bizarrely able to do customer service with ease. 

“True, but he's a new sight,” the stranger gestures towards Takeru and sends him a bright pearly smile. 

“New to you. He was one of my part-timers once upon a time,” Kusanagi replies. 

“Ooh! You actually have other employees! I was starting to think you were making them up to cover up your workaholic nature.” 

That caught Kusanagi off guard but the stranger didn't seem to care about his bluntness. He took his order and strolled off like nothing happened. 

“I swear I know that man from somewhere, but I can't figure out where,” Kusanagi mumbles before getting into cleaning up his counter. 

Takeru didn't ask about the cafe's latest oddball customer. He's run into his fair share working the dojo so instead he started took off too. Might as while see if he can find a hint of something weird going on. Street punks were always good for information about shady goings on and the cafe wasn't the kind of place he'd find them. The place is too clean for that kind of crowd.

Not that he's up to date on things like that. He still looks like a delinquent most days but Kiku would kick his ass if she found him picking fights on the street again...it happened once, never again. No more month long lectures about him screwing up his life for him!Thank you very much. 

That disconnect was enough to cause most of the people he'd come across to either ignore him or give him some kind of run around. The worst was a purple haired teen Takeru wanted to lecture. Kids that age shouldn't be running around with street gangs. They also shouldn't have been hackers going against large corporations or cyber terrorists but that's not the point!

After a few hours of getting no where he collapsed onto a bench to take a break from wondering around the city. All that work and the most he heard were stupid absurd rumors about another city. God he felt more useless than he did back then. All these years, and he was still barely any help. 

“Here,” Someone shoved a paper bag in his face. It was the stranger that had been at the cafe earlier offering him something from Cafe Nagi. . 

“Umm, Thanks?” he grabbed the bag and started at it. 

“You're welcome,” For a second the stranger sounded like Yusaku or at least what Takeru remembered him sounding like. Argh great he's losing his mind.

The other man slid onto the bench and waited for him to reply. Any trace of the outgoing persona he had when interacting Kusanagi gone as he just starred at Takeru silently. After few seconds of awkward starring Takeru figured he should probably say something, anything, it was getting creepy. 

The stranger beat him to it thought. 

“Sorry if I make you uncomfortable, I'm still figuring out how to talk to people and you looked like you needed some company.” His expression loosened up a bit and Takeru could swear it reminded him of his missing friend. 

“But you were doing just fine chatting with Kusaangi earlier!” The words blurted out faster then Takeru could stop them. But it was true!

“He's easy to talk to, and it's part of his job to be nice to people,” the strangers points out quietly.  
“But if you're uncomfortable, I'll leave.”

Almost as quickly as the other man had appeared he vanished slipping off the bench and disappearing into a nearby crowd of people. Without giving Takeru the chance to respond.

That was weird but at least he got some food out of it. Though Kusanagi probably would have given him something if he'd asked so...oh well more food for him. 

That being said Kusanagi is a generous person but that didn't mean he would let potential help go to waste. He stuck an apron on Takeru the following day and took off. There was a vague mention of him being back in time for closing that night but otherwise he had no idea where the man ran off to. 

Thankfully nobody to obnoxious stopped by the cafe until the stranger came strolling up looking a little sheepish. 

“Good afternoon. Guess this place really does have more then one employee huh?” 

He shrugged, “I'm just filling while the owner is away.”

“Oh well then can I have a hot dog and pop please,”the man asked with a small smile. He remained quiet as Takeru worked on his order, only moving to stare off into the distance behind him. For split a second Takeru could have sworn the yellow in the man's yellow-green eyes were glowing but the man turned suddenly to face him and they were normal. Must have been his eyes playing tricks on him. 

Still he finished the man's order and handed it to him in time to see his next customer coming up down the road. The stranger moved off to the side of the cafe to find a seat while Ryoken came walking up to the window. 

“So Kusanagi forced you to cover for him while he went to the hockey game.” So that where he ran off too. The man did say once that he was into sports before their lives all went to hell. 

“Yeah, he was nice enough to let me stay over while I'm in town so I don't mind,” he replied shrugging again. It's been a few years, so he doesn't hate the former Hanoi leader as much anymore especially since he was the one who did most of the searching online after Yusaku disappeared. 

“Hmm, I suppose you can make my order then?” 

“Sure, so that's five veggie dogs,” he teased, and the other man rolled his eyes.

“Spectre's not around so I can have meat...make it ten though Aso wants a few too.”Takeru doesn't know who the other person he was talking about is but went along with it. Kusanagi will be happy to hear business was good today. 

Ryoken glanced over at the stranger who hadn't touched his food and was just playing around on his phone at the table. 

“Is he someone 'we' know?” he asked lowly. Assuming the we are Kusanagi, him, and anyone else who was involved back then, no. 

“No he's just one of those people with a familiar face,” As he replied the stranger noticed them watching him and packs up to scurry off. 

“Right.” 

“Leave him alone. He's just an oddball that likes hanging around the cafe,” he warns noting the suspicious expression on the other man's face. 

“So were you and Yusaku and you both turned out to be people of interest. This cafe seems to draw in suspicious people.” 

“Here take your food and leave the poor guy alone, he doesn't need any of your drama,” Takeru hopes the stranger manages to keep off of Ryoken's radar. No one else needs to deal with the other man's over barring nature and habit of basically stalking people. 

Kiku once threatened to kick Ryokens ass when she found a bug by their mailbox...yeah, he's just glad the bugs were kept at a distance. 

“We'll see,”Ryoken paid for his food and walked with a very intent expression on his face. Oh great, poor guy doesn't know what's coming. 

He sighted and proceeded to clean up the truck since the cafe was dead. In a few uneventful hours, Kusanagi came back grinning like mad. 

“Your team win?” 

“How'd you know?” Kusanagi asked surprised.

“Ryoken stopped by earlier...he may have taken an interest in that regular of yours,” he replies. 

“Oh god, poor soul doesn't stand a chance,”the man laughs and starts helping him pack up. “Anyway I got a call during the match from the hospital. We should go there tomorrow.” 

“Alright.” He was here because of that, and he just wished that wasn't why he's visiting. It would have been so much better if Takeru came back to visit Yusaku working at the cafe or something instead of the hospital. 

Kusanagi smiled sadly at him and gave him a pat on the back. “I'll be here the whole way.” 

“Thank you.” Takeru felt sorry for the man, Kusanagi's been supportive of all of them and he's only a few years older than them in reality. Forced to grow up fast because his brother came home shell of a person after being kidnapped. Now years later he was still dealing with the fallout of the incident. 

“Come lets go home for the night.” 

When they got up the next day he really wanted to crawl back into bed instead of going out. Kusanagi's solution to his gloom was to blast really loud pop music until he got up. Somehow they managed to make it to the hospital with very little interference after that and very little obnoxious pop music. The other man also apologized for his methods after they got in the truck. 

“Fujiki, alright come with me his room is over here,” the nurse said after they had asked for directions to his room when they arrived. 

She showed them a door at the end of the hallway and walked back towards the desk to give them some time to walk in themselves. 

“Well you ready?” Kusanagi asked grabbing the door handle. 

“As I'll ever be.” 

Turns out neither of them were ready. They both shriek loudly upon seeing the stranger sitting on the foot of the bed watching over the unconscious older Yusaku. Their old friend's hair had grown a lot of the years and would probably rival Aoi's at this point while his body was even tighter then it had been before he was admitted. Yusaku was an unconscious pile of skin and bones and the stranger was just siting there looking at him sadly. 

“What are you doing in here?” Kusanagi asked finding the ability to speak finally. 

“The hospital called me, apparently we're distantly related and they needed permission from next of kin to go on with their plans,” the stranger explains looking over at them. 

“Apparently?” Takeru found voice after a few minutes and asked. 

“Yeah, I'm an amnesiac, so I'm still finding stuff like that out,” the man replies, and the nurse comes rushing into the room,

“Is everything alright in here?” 

“Yes, they were just surprised to see someone in here,” he waved off her concern and the overworked nurse nodes and started back out the door.

“Well try to keep it down. This is a hospital!” 

“What's the final decision then?” Kusangi asked after she was gone. 

“They don't think I'm compident to make that kind of decision so they're going to file for power of attorney. They plan to take him off life support once it's approved,” there was something detached about how the stranger said that. 

“I only came by to see who my apparent relative was.” 

“In that case could you give us some time with Yuskau alone? We're old friends of his,” Kusanagi asks moving closer to the bed and the man moved off the bed quietly. 

“Sure, I think I'm going to leave for the day anyway,” with that he swept out the room without looking at either of them. Something about what he said didn't sit right with Takeru. There was more to his story. 

“I'm not the only one freaked out by that right?” were the first words to comes out of his mouth after the stranger was gone. 

“Yeah, things are starting to get creepy with that man,” Kusanagi replies instantly starring at the door like something horrible walked through it. 

“What do we do?” he asked looking back towards Yusaku. Nothing in the exchanged had any effect on him at all. He wasn't aware he was going to be declared dead. 

“I don't know. All the researching I did never said anything about Yusaku having living relatives or at least any that cared,” Kusanagi replied , “and it's been years since found a single lead on what happened with him and Ai.” He slumped against the wall exhausted. 

Takeru joined him against the wall a few seconds later. This whole thing just got a whole lot weirder. 

They probably spent about an hour there coming to terms with what was going on. Eventually, though Kusaangi dragged them both out of the hospital. They did nothing once they got back his place but the following morning the man had to get to work and Takeru needed something to do while he was in town so he was dragged along. 

Oh how their day went down hill as soon as the stranger popped up for his daily order. 

“Good afternoon,” he greeted cheerily. 

“Good afternoon,” Kusanagi and him replied. 

“Look I'm sorry about yesterday, I didn't know,” he said turning melancholic immediately. The shift in mood gave Takeru whip lash. Yesterday he didn't seem to care either way what was happening. 

“Sure, Umm you want your usual order?” Kusanagi sounded better then he probably would have. 

“Yep!” And he's right back to being cheery. 

Over the stranger's shoulder, Takeru noticed Ryoken stalking up to the cafe. “Who are you?”

The man spins around and points to himself, “You mean me?” 

“Yes, I'm asking you,” Ryoken replied glaring at the stranger whose eyes started darting around like he was getting nervous. 

“I'm nobody.” 

“Your less then nobody, there are no records of you outside some CCTV footage,” Ryoken stepped closer to him but the stranger tried to back away only to hit the side of the truck. 

“Eep! That's kind of stalkerish don't you think?!” 

“So is some anonymous person going to visit our brain dead friend multiple times and erasing the footage!”

The stranger squeaked and rammed into the truck a second time causing a loud banging noise before he tried to dodge the advancing Ryoken again. 

“Hey! It's not like that.”

“I don't believe you,” Ryoken managed to grab the man and shove him into the truck. 

“Hey! You need to tell me when you're going to stuff like that, I can still get in trouble for you accosting my customers,” Kusanagi finally calls out the window. “Also watch it I don't want to buff out any large dents you make!”

“Really you're concerned about your truck when he clearly knows something about Yusaku?!” The stranger took Ryoken momentary lapse in concentration to slip out of his hold and try to run off. Only to be caught by Spectre when he wasn't looking. 

“Greetings, it's nice to meet you,” Spectre said as he held the man so he couldn't get away no matter how hard he seemed to struggle. 

The situation got worse once their struggle loosened the scarf around the strangers neck causing it fall down enough to reveal the Soltis marker on the stranger's neck. Everyone but Spectre frozen when they noticed the pink light. 

“That's interesting, I thought Soltis were supposed to be stronger,” Spectre started to mock but the stranger throw him off as he finished his sentence. 

“They are, I just didn't want to hurt you,” it said sneering at the other man. 

The cafe's best customer was a freakin' Soltis! What the fuck?!

“So our biggest suspect is a Soltis? Tell me are you the dark Ignis?” Ryoken demanded eyeing his subordinated as he got off the ground. 

“Dark Ignis? What is wrong with you first you shove me into a truck and then spout nonsense at me,” it growled. Next to Takeru Kusanagi worked his way out of the truck while he stood there in awe. 

“Why were you visiting Yusaku if you're not Ai?” Kusanagi asked getting closer to the two maybe to get between them if soemthign happens again. 

“I wasn't lying when I said I was something of an amnesiac. I have a few memories with him in them and wanted to see if visiting would help me figure things out,” the stranger admitted shrugging. “I have a few memories of someone named Ai too but not a whole lot” 

“Great. Spectre come on we have work to do. As for you Soltis watch your back,” Ryoken warned before he and Spectre started to walk away. There wasn't much more they could do in person if the Soltis refused to answer them so they were probably going to find backdoor online. 

“Gez I knew he was a creep but that was a bit much,” the stranger said as he watched them go.  
“You knew?” Takeru asked out the window. He was still stationed in the truck, so he had to almost shout. 

“Kind of, could we stop talking about me now, or I might just go home,” he replied quickly. 

“No! I just got the first hint of what happened to my best friend all those years ago and I'm not going to let that go!”

“Takeru,” the stranger mumbled and he gawked at the man. He never told him his name in all the times they've run into each other. 

“How do you know my name?”

“How do you know his name?”

The AI didn't reply he just suddenly gripped his hand like he was in pain. He made a few noises that sounded like he was in pain before Takeru decided to get out of the truck to check up on him. Kusanagi seemed to have the same idea and walked over to the hunch over Soltis. 

“Hey are you okay?” Takeru asked once he got close enough. 

“No, I think my programming still has a lot of bugs I need to work out. I don't know why I know your name. I just get the feeling I know you both,” he answered setting himself upright again. It lead to Takeru being face to face with the light on his neck. 

Then suddenly the stranger shoved them away and glared at them, “I'm not him! I don't want to be him!

“What are you talking about?” Kusanagi asked throwing his hands up trying to look nonthreatening. 

“I'm not Yusaku! And I don't want to be!” he cried backing away. 

“We didn't say you were,” Takeru said thinking maybe he was watching an AI have a mental breakdown somehow. 

“I can see it on your face. You miss your friend and I...” he trailed off looking away. “I'm your key to getting him “back, but it's not possible. I tried it before, and it would kill us both!” 

Yeah, the Soltis was having some kindof break down in front of them, and it was both fascinating and horroryifing to watch.. 

“What do you mean tried?” Kusanagi asked reaching for the panicked android. 

“I was your friend. I know that much but something happened and it was painful and I can't remember much now. Woke up in a warehouse with more bugs then an ant colony!” 

With lines like that he sounds more like Ai than Yusaku. “In that case why did you come to cafe if don't want to be him?”

There are a lot of other questions but one at a time! Might make this easier. 

“You both seem nice, and I don't know what else I should do. It's weird being a free roaming AI with memory issues.”

“Do you have a name?” Takeru asked it was getting kind of annoying to call him stranger and I might help to redirect the conversation. Maybe the AI would stop freaking out if they distracted him. 

The stranger grin nervously at him for a second, “Asagao Fujiki,...I needed to keep the last name to get into the hospital...”

“Speaking of the hospital,”Asagao glared at Kusanagi cutting him off, “Don't, there's nothing I can do about that. Your friend is dead!”

“Sorry if we're aggravating you. This is a lot for us too. I mean you're saying someone we care about and have been searching for years is dead but also freaking out and saying you're not him,” Takeru explained softly. Despite everything the weird familiarity they all had made it hard for him to be to angry at the wreck of an AI next to him. 

Kusanagi sighed deflating immediately, “He's right, it's not your fault I'm sorry for ganging up on you.”

The bug-eyed look on Asagao's face hurt a little bit, but it was also nice to see. Kusanagi sighed heavily again. “How about you to go back to my place and figure this out, you can catch me when I get there later.” 

“Alright, Kusangi!” Asagao's memory might not be the only problem here.

Somehow they managed to get away from the cafe in time for a rush people. How would they have explained the Soltis freaking to the customers? Would the AI have come back to the cafe if they'd let him walk off after all that?

“I'm sorry Takeru,” the other man said suddenly while they were walking. 

“Why?”

“Everything. I'm don't know.” 

“...?”

“My memories are inconsistent, so I sometimes forget a lot of things, like what I do or say.” Asagao stopped and turned to him to see how he would respond. 

This time it was his turn to sigh, this was going to be harder then he expected. The AI was even more unreliable then they originally thought. . 

“Wait! You basically said you were Ai and Yusaku, how is that possible?” With all the craziness he didn't pick up on the most important thing the stranger said. 

“No I'm me. Can you accept that?”

At the moment no, he couldn't but over the next few days he tried to. With Asagao's issues it was hard to tell whether or not he was telling the truth about anything! Sometimes that lead to a lot of arguing, mostly between Takeru and him. Kusanagi had to work, so he wasn't around for a lot of it. 

There were times where the AI would seemingly switch personalities too. A few times Asagao would go back to being as quiet and awkward as he'd been the first time Takeru meet him. It strangely enduring to watch him get so wrapped up in some project...almost like...it's time isn't it. 

Takeru made his way to the hospital on his own the following day. It's been a week he needs to get back to his life. Kiku and his grandparents aren't going to wait forever. It's not a large amount of time but in the long run he's had years. 

“Hey Yusaku, we,” god he felt like an idiot standing there. Sitting on the edge of the bed didn't help but , “ What happened when you went to fight Ai?Nobody's been able to figure out what happened, even Ryoken and he's devoted to finding Ai in case his still somehow planning to end humanity. The nurses must think I sound crazy.” Takeru believed he sounded crazy. 

“I moved back to my home town after a few months because my grandparents wanted me to. It's not like I would have been much help here and eventually I got on with my life, kind of. It's weird when someone you care about is sudden gone. Only with you I didn't have someone to blame like I did with my parents. I missed you, but I continued on with my life. I assumed eventually you'd come back but then Kusanagi told me, the hospital wanted to let you go and Kiku got annoyed of me moping around.”

“So I was forced to come back while they worked out the paper work and ran into the strangest soltis ever. He's so freakin weird! and he had this break down a couple of days going saying he's not you but he knows you...I think he his, I think something happened when you and Ai dueled. “

“You're right.” Takeru blinked a couple of times before looking around to see who answered him. Asagao was leaning against the door watching him intensely. 

“Ai asked Yusaku to fuse with him because he wanted a better future for them and Yusaku said yes. However Fusing a human and an AI no matter how closely related they are was going to cause some problems. When Yusaku tried to go back to being human, he couldn't, not for long at least so Ai shoved them back into the network and eventually I managed to put myself together out of their mess. It's ironic in hindsight that Yusaku told Ai neither of them would be themselves if they did that.” 

“But you said you didn't remember anything?” Takeru said accusingly, the AI's been inconsistent from day one and this was more then he was willing to handle. 

Asaagao shrugged, “That's true, but I have my moments and I've spent years trying to piece myself together out of their mess. I didn't want to get your hopes up about him nor did I want you to think I was him. So I'll ask again, can you accept me or do you still want your friend back?” 

Takeru scuffed at the other man, “Of course I want my friend back but if it's not possible then i'll accept he's gone. As for you I've only known you a week! and you've been either lying the whole time or missing a lot of screws.” 

“Oh I'm missing plenty of screws! This soltis was in a ditch when I found it,” like that it felt like a spell had been lifted on the room. Asagao loosened up and Takeru himself let out a much needed exhale. The other man took a seat on edge of the bed opposite of him. “I'm sorry for how I've been acting, there's a lot of configuring I still have to do but that doesn't excuse my actions. Forgive me?” 

“Not yet, I want some time to get to know you first,” Takeru replied, and he couldn't help the small smile on his face. It hurt to lose Yusaku, but he wanted to get to know who he became. Asagao smiled back at him and laughed a little.

“Thank you.” 

By the end of the week, he and Asagao were saying good bye to Kusanagi at the train station. He didn't need to stay and be there when the hospital finally pulled the pug. Takeru got his sense of closure sitting there with Asagao that day. 

“Are you sure you don't want to stick around?” 

Takeru shook his head, “ No, my grandpa is too old to run the dojo by himself and Kiku needs to get back to her school work.”

“And you're sure they're okay with him?” the man asked glancing over at Asagao who was busy chatting with a few other people that were also waiting. 

“Yeah, I told them he's a Soltis and they were amazed I wanted something to do with technology Kiku doesn't believe he's real. Besides its better that he comes with me, he'll attract less attention in country side,” he stopped for a second to watch the other laugh with some people. Really Takeru just wants to see his new friend be happy. 

"Kiku said she wanted proof!"

**Author's Note:**

> I've wanted to 'rewrite' this story for awhile but most of that time it was going to be an angsty chapter 2 instead of a real story like it is here. It's the same way with a few of my other stories especially as i get better at writing.
> 
> I think it ended this way because I needed to vent accepting how life has changed the last couple of months. Hope ya'll are doing alright out there.


End file.
